THE  oakst.hds? 

WORKMEN’S  COMPENSATION 
SITUATION  IN  NEW  YORK  STATE 


By  WILLIAM  T.  EMMET 

Superintendent  of  Insurance  of  the  State  of  New  York 


An  Address  Delivered  at  the  Meeting  of 
The  National  Convention  of  Insurance  Commissioners 
Burlington,  Vermont,  August  i,  1913 


THE 


WORKMEN'S  COMPENSATION 
SITUATION  IN  NEW  YORK  STATE 


Gentlemen  of  the  Convention: 

New  York  is  one  of  the  states  in  which  it  has  been  impossible, 
as  yet,  to  place  upon  the  statute  books  a  satisfactory  Workmen’s 
Compensation  Law.  A  bill  of  this  kind  which  was  passed  by 
the  Legislature  and  approved  by  the  Governor  some  years  ago 
was  subsequently  declared  by  the  New  York  Court  of  Appeals  to 
be  unconstitutional,  because  it  was  a  compulsory  measure.  But 
even  if  this  had  not  happened,  our  first  attempt  at  compensation 
legislation  in  New  York  State  would  not,  in  the  changed  condi¬ 
tion  of  thought  on  this  subject,  be  regarded  to-day  as  a  very 
satisfactory  solution  of  the  problem.  For  one  thing,  its  schedules 
would  be  thought  much  too  low.  Nor  did  it  contain  any  pro¬ 
visions  ensuring  the  payment  of  the  compensation  which  the  law 
gave  to  injured  working  men  and  their  dependents  for  injuries 
sustained  in  the  course  of  industrial  employments.  Judged  by 
modern  standards,  therefore,  this  measure  which  our  Court  of 
Appeals  declared  unconstitutional  some  years  ago  would  be  re¬ 
garded  to-day  as  an  inadequate  and  unscientific  contribution  to 
the  great  and  growing  volume  of  existing  law  upon  this  most 
important  subject. 

The  Court  of  Appeals’  decision  above  referred  to  settled  the 
question,  however,  as  to  the  general  form  which  any  future  com¬ 
pensation  law  must  take  in  the  State  of  New  York.  Until  the 
Constitution  of  the  State  of  New  York  is  amended,  we  can  have  no 
compensation  law  in  New  York  except  one  that  is  elective  in 
form.  Starting  with  that  definitely  determined  fact,  a  serious 
effort  was  made  last  winter  to  pass  a  satisfactory  Workmen’s 
Compensation  Law.  The  purpose  of  my  present  remarks  is  to 
describe,  as  briefly  as  possible,  the  struggle  which  ensued,  and  to 
indicate  some  of  the  reasons  why  it  all  came  to  nothing  in  the 
end. 

It  should  be  stated  in  the  first  place  that  after  the  adverse 
decision  of  the  Court  of  Appeals  upon  the  so-called  Wainwright 
bill,  certain  representatives  of  labor  organizations,  co-operating 
with  members  of  the  State  Senate  and  Assembly,  drafted  a 
pseudo-elective  bill  which  was  introduced  during  the  legislative 
session  of  1912  and  became  known  as  the  Bayne-Sullivan  bill. 
This  bill  established  a  high  rate  of  compensation  fcr  industrial 


4 


accidents,  and  provided  for  compulsory  insurance  through  the 
instrumentality  of  a  state  fund.  All  employers  and  employees 
who  came  within  the  operation  of  the  proposed  law  were  to  make 
payments  into  this  fund.  Employers  were  given  no  alternative 
methods  of  insuring  the  compensation  payments  for  which  they 
might  become  liable.  An  elaborate  new  state  organism  was  pro¬ 
vided  for  the  supervision  and  control  of  the  newly  created  state 
fund.  The  credit  of  the  state  was  not  placed  behind  the  pro¬ 
posed  fund.  The  duty  rested  upon  those  who  collected  and  dis¬ 
bursed  this  fund  to  see  to  it  that  enough  money^  was  raised  by 
contributions  from  employers  and  employees  to  make  the  fund 
adequate  to  meet  any  demands  which  might  be  made  upon  it. 
What  we  now  know  as  “  self-insurance  ”  was  not  provided  for, 
nor  was  any  recognition  given  to  insurance  in  stock  companies 
or  mutual  associations.  Employers  who  elected  not  to  come 
within  the  provisions  of  the  act  were  stripped  of  their  common- 
law  defenses  and  rendered  liable  to  damages  without  limit.  Some 
of  the  advocates  of  the  Bayne-Sullivan  bill  stated  very  frankly 
that  they  were  not  so  much  interested  in  establishing  the  prin¬ 
ciple  of  compensation  in  Yew  York  as  in  enlarging  the  common- 
law  liability  of  non-assenting  employers. 

The  Bayne-Sullivan  bill  was  passed  in  the  State  Senate,  but 
failed  of  passage  in  the  Assembly.  Thus  the  legislative  session 
of  1912  terminated  without  effective  action  with  respect  to 
Workmen’s  Compensation.  Realizing  that  the  measure  I  have 
mentioned  would  probably  be  introduced  again  in  the  legislative 
session  of  1913,  and  believing  that  the  establishment  of  a 
monopolistic  system  of  state  insurance  would  be  an  unwise  de¬ 
parture  for  the  State  of  Yew  York  to  embark  on  at  this  time, 
I  deemed  it  my  duty  as  Superintendent  of  Insurance  of  Yew 
York  State  to  undertake,  during  the  summer  of  1912,  the  prep¬ 
aration  of  a  Workmen’s  Compensation  bill  conceived  on  what 
seemed  to  be  broader  and  fairer  lines  than  those  tf'hich  had  been 
followed  in  preparing  the  measure  which  had  failed  of  passage 
earlier  in  the  year.  My  associates  and  I  approached  this  work 
believing  that  such  a  task  lay  well  within  the  province  of  an 
efficient  and  well-manned  insurance  department.  I  felt  that  the 
whole  subject  was  a  technical  one,  inseparably  connected  with 
insurance.  I  hoped  that  in  presenting  a  completed  bill  fcr  legis¬ 
lative  consideration,  the  Insurance  Department  would  be  credited 
with  having  acted  in  what  it  believed  to  be  the  interest  of  the 
entire  state.  We  certainly  had  no  axes  of  our  own  to  grind,  and 


5 


were  interested  only  in  establishing  in  New  York  the  principle  of 
Workmen’s  Compensation  upcn  as  sound  a  basis  as  was  possible 
under  any  bill  that  is  elective  in  form. 

The  bill  we  finally  presented  to  the  Legislature  was,  com¬ 
pared  with  most  other  compensation  laws  in  the  United  States, 
exceedingly  liberal  in  the  rates  of  compensation  which  it  estab¬ 
lished.  These  were  fixed  at  as  high  a  figure  as  was  thought  to 
be  compatible  with  the  acceptance  of  the  act  by  employers. 
With  any  higher  schedules,  we  felt  that  employers  would  refrain 
from  coming  within  the  operation  of  the  law,  and  that  thus  one 
of  our  chief  purposes  —  a  purpose  which  has  to  be  constantly  borne 
in  mind  in  the  preparation  of  any  elective  measure  —  would  be 
defeated.  The  bill  was  not  limited  to  hazardous  employments, 
as  was  the  Bayne-Sullivan  measure.  It  was  designed  to  cover 
all  employments  except  domestic  service  and  farm  labor.  It  took 
away  the  present  common-law  defenses  from  employers  who  re¬ 
jected  its  provisions.  It  required  employers  to  insure  their  com¬ 
pensation  payments,  but  it  allowed  them  several  alternative 
methods  of  insurance.  As  originally  drawn,  the  bill  permitted 
employers  of  undoubted  financial  responsibility  to  carry  their 
own  insurance  under  proper  restrictions,  and  it  permitted  em¬ 
ployers  who  could  not  qualify  as  self-insurers  to  insure  either 
in  stock  companies  or  in  mutual  employers  organizations  —  the 
machinery  for  the  establishment  of  which  was  provided.  All 
these  insurance  plans  were  placed  under  the  jurisdiction  of  the 
Superintendent  of  Insurance.  That  official  was  also  charged 
with  the  duty  of  seeing  that  the  premiums  charged  by  stock 
companies  and  by  the  new  mutuals  should  be  adequate  premiums. 
Our  bill,  in  a  general  way,  followed  the  plan  of  the  Michigan 
Law.  In  its  original  form  it  contained  no  provision,  however, 
for  the  creation  of  a  state  insurance  fund. 

This  bill,  which  became  known  during  the  legislative  session 
of  1913  as  the  Foley-Walker  bill,  was  introduced  in  both  houses 
of  the  New  York  Legislature  at  the  commencement  of  the  ses¬ 
sion.  Almost  immediately  thereafter  the  representatives  of 
organized  labor  presented,  as  it  was  anticipated  they  would,  the 
so-called  Bayne-Sullivan  bill  of  1912  for  renewed  consideration. 
This  measure  became  known,  during  the  session  of  1913,  as  the 
Murtaugh- Jackson  bill.  It  was  changed  somewhat  from  its 
original  form,  during  the  session,  but  retained  until  the  end 
most  of  its  distinguishing  provisions  to  which  reference  has 
already  been  made. 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2017  with  funding  from 

University  of  Illinois  Urbana-Champaign  Alternates 


https://archive.org/details/workmenscompensaOOemme 


6 


It  would  be  unprofitable  at  this  time  to  dwell  upon  the  details 
of  the  controversy  which  raged  during  the  entire  legislative  ses¬ 
sion  of  1913  over  the  respective  merits  of  these  two  compensa¬ 
tion  bills.  It  developed,  before  the  end,  into  a  very  acrimonious 
controversy  indeed.  Whether  its  reverberations  extended  be¬ 
yond  the  limits  of  New  York  State  I  have  no  means  of  knowing, 
but  1  should  not  be  in  the  least  surprised  to  hear  that  they  had. 
Organized  labor  was  alleged  by  its  representatives  in  Albany  to 
be  unanimously  opposed  to  the  Foley-Walker  bill,  and  unani¬ 
mously  in  favor  of  the  Murtaugh- Jackson  bill.  The  motives  of 
those  who  favored  the  Foley -Walker  bill  were  vigorously  at¬ 
tacked  by  these  gentlemen.  They  so  far  honored  me  as  to  file 
charges  against  me  with  the  Governor.  The  measure  was  repre¬ 
sented  as  having  emanated  from  the  casualty  companies  —  as 
having,  in  fact,  been  drawn  entirely  in  their  interest.  The  sug¬ 
gestion  was  spread  broadcast  that  it  would,  if  enacted,  give  a 
monopoly  of  the  business  of  liability  insurance  to  these  com¬ 
panies.  Neither  of  these  statements  contained  even  the  pro¬ 
verbial  grain  of  truth.  The  bill  was  drawn  by  the  Insurance 
Department,  not  by  the  casualty  companies;  and  instead  of 
granting  a  monopoly  to  stock  companies,  in  the  future  writing 
of  liability  insurance,  it  destroyed  an  existing  monopoly  which 
these  companies  now  enjoy  in  New  York  State.  Evidence  was 
presented,  on  the  other  hand,  to  show  that  the  Michigan  Law  - — - 
with  less  liberal  schedules  of  compensation  than  ours,  and  with 
the  same  recognition  of  stock  companies  —  was  working  in  a 
manner  satisfactory  to  the  labor  organizations  of  the  State  of 
Michigan  and  to  the  people  at  large.  Similar  evidence  of  the 
essential  fairness  of  the  scheme  provided  by  the  Foley- Walker 
bill  was  found  in  the  experience  of  Massachusetts  and  New  Jer¬ 
sey  with  their  present  compensation  laws.  The  upshot  of  the 
whole  fight  was  that,  notwithstanding  the  protests  which  the 
representatives  of  organized  labor  addressed  to  the  Legislature, 
our  bill,  with  one  or  two  amendments,  passed  both  houses  and 
was  sent  to  the  Governor  for  his  approval.  The  chief  amend¬ 
ments  which  the  Legislature  made  in  the  bill  as  originally  pre¬ 
sented  were  (1)  the  inclusion  of  a  state-administered  fund  as  a 
fourth  alternative  method  of  insuring  compensation  payments 
under  the  act,  and  (2)  a  slight  increase  in  the  compensation 
schedules  which  were  in  the  bill  as  at  first  introduced.  This  in¬ 
crease  —  while  it  slightly  chilled  the  enthusiasm  of  some  em¬ 
ployers  who  had  supported  the  bill  in  its  original  form  —  was 


accepted  by  the  great  body  of  employers  as,  under  all  the  circum¬ 
stances,  fair.  The  so-called  state  fund  was  incorporated  in  the 
final  draft  of  the  bill  as  a  concession  to  those  opponents  of  the 
original  measure  whose  opposition  was  based  upon  the  fact  that 
it  contained  no  recognition  whatever  of  the  principle  of  State  In¬ 
surance.  It  was  felt  that  while  this  principle  could  not  he  ac¬ 
cepted  in  the  monopolistic  form  in  which  it  was  advocated  by 
the  labor  leaders,  it  could  with  entire  propriety  be  recognized  as 
one  of  the  alternative  forms  of  permissible  insurance  under  the 
act. 

The  Governor  vetoed  the  Workmen’s  Compensation  bill  which 
was  passed  by  the  Legislature,  for  reasons  satisfactory  to  him¬ 
self,  and  which  were  set  forth  in  some  detail  in  his  veto  memoran¬ 
dum.  I  need  scarcely  say  that  1  disagree  with  the  Governor  in 
the  view  he  took  of  the  matter.  It  is  not  my  intention,  however, 
to  complain  here  about  the  way  in  which  this  important  problem 
was  handled  last  spring  by  the  distinguished  Chief  Executive  of 
my  state.  So  far  as  I  could  grasp  his  point  of  view,  it  was  that 
no  legislation  on  this  subject  which  did  not  meet  with  the  ap¬ 
proval  of  the  gentlemen  who  represented  organized  labor  at 
Albany  during  the  legislative  session  could  be  regarded  as  satis¬ 
factory.  In  this  I  differ  with  him,  although  I  agree  that  it  is 
highly  desirable  that  legislation  of  this  sort  should  have  the  ap¬ 
proval  of  organized  labor.  But  I  cannot  lose  sight  of  the  fact 
that  the  Foley-Walker  bill,  if  it  had  become  a  law,  would  have 
affected  some  2,500,000  workers  of  the  state,  and  of  these  only 
about  400,000  are  included  in  the  ranks  of  organized  labor.  Un- 
organized  working  people  are  entitled  to  consideration,  too,  I  re¬ 
spectfully  submit.  Personally  I  am  inclined,  also,  to  dcubt  the 
assertion  that  the  rank  and  file  of  organized  labor  throughout 
the  state  were  antagonistic  to  the  bill  which  was  passed,  despite 
the  assertions  of  a  few  labor  leaders  to  that  effect.  I  have  every 
reason  to  suppose  that  if  our  measure  had  become  a  law  it  would 
have  met  with  approval  from  the  labor  organizations  of  the  state, 
just  as  a  somewhat  similar  bill  did  in  Michigan.  However, 
Governor  Sulzer  thought  differently,  and  I  have  no  desire  what¬ 
ever  to  question  his  motives,  or  to  cast  any  doubt  upon  the  lofty 
patriotism  which  undoubtedly  animated  him  in  what  he  did. 

What  interested  me  greatly  in  the  whole  compensation  struggle 
last  winter,  however,  was  the  curious  twist  which  the  representa¬ 
tives  of  organized  labor  at  the  Capitol  gave  to  the  discussion 
before  it  reached  its  end  in  the  Governor’s  veto.  We  commenced 


s 


with  the  question  of  Workmen’s  Compensation,  and  we  ended 
with  the  question  of  State  Insurance.  We  were  chiefly  con¬ 
cerned,  at  first,  in  determining  what  would  be  fair  in  the  way  of 
compensation  schedules  —  whether  those  included  in  the  bill 
were  tco  liberal,  or  not  liberal  enough  —  whether  they  were  so 
happily  adjusted  as  to  induce  employers  to  accept  them,  and  at 
the  same  time  prove  reasonably  satisfactory  to  injured  working 
men  and  their  dependents.  We  supposed  that  these  would  be 
regarded  as  the  questions  of  prime  importance  in  this  discussion. 
We  thought  that  the  method  of  insuring  the  payment  of  the  com¬ 
pensation  provided  for  in  the  bill  would  be  regarded  more  as  an 
interesting  matter  of  detail  than  as  the  principal  question  in¬ 
volved.  We  felt  that  this  insurance  question  was  one  which  had 
to  be  worked  out  sensibly  and  fairly,  but  we  looked  on  it  as  to 
some  extent  a  technical  question  and  one  which  was  a  long  way 
removed  from  being  the  matter  of  vital  concern  to  organized 
labor  which  the  labor  men  finally  declared  it  to  be.  Few  things 
have  ever  surprised  me  more  than  the  way  in  which  this  subordi¬ 
nate  feature  of  the  proposed  legislation  assumed  such  huge  pro¬ 
portions  in  the  minds  of  the  representatives  of  labor  at  the  Capi¬ 
tol  as  in  the  end  tc  blind  their  eyes  completely  to  the  larger 
issues  involved.  It  would  be  exceedingly  interesting  to  consider 
at  length  how  it  came  about  that  the  discussion  took  this  turn. 
But  this,  I  think,  would  involve  a  much  longer  talk  than  I  have 
any  intention  of  inflicting  upon  you. 

The  fact  is,  though,  that  the  whole  trouble  arose  out  of  what 
on  its  face  looked  like  an  attitude  of  settled  hostility  on  the  part 
of  laboring  men  toward  the  casualty  companies  —  a  hostility  so 
virulent  and  uncompromising  that  nothing  apparently  would 
satisfy  it  but  the  extermination  of  these  companies  and  the  sub¬ 
stitution  of  a  system  of  state  insurance  in  their  place.  The  atti¬ 
tude  of  those  who  finally  induced  the  Governor  to  veto  our  bill 
was  that  these  companies  had  been  tried  and  found  wanting,  and 
that  the  time  had  arrived  when  they  should  be  put  out  of  busi¬ 
ness  once  and  for  all.  The  position  I  took  on  this  subject  was 
that,  while  there  had  undoubtedly  been  many  grounds  for  com¬ 
plaint  against  these  companies  in  the  past,  the  matters  which  had 
created  most  irritation  were  things  inherent  to  the  present  state 
of  our  employers  liability  laws,  and  that  it  was  scarcely  fair  to 
charge  all  responsibility  for  these  things  upon  the  insurance 
companies.  These  things  were  the  inevitable  outgrowths  of  our 
existing  liability  laws,  and  responsibility  for  them  was  chargeable 


upon  our  entire  citizenship,  which  permitted  these  laws  to  re¬ 
main  upon  the  statute  books.  I  contended,  and  I  still  contend, 
that  such  liability  laws  as  we  have  today  in  the  State  of  New 
York  are  inadequate,  archaic,  unprogressive  and  completely  out 
of  harmony  with  the  spirit  of  an  advancing  civilization.  I  con¬ 
tended,  and  I  still  contend,  that  the  proper  thing  to  do  is  to 
abolish  the  barbarous  conditions  under  which  this  business  has 
been  carried  on  in  the  past,  and  that  if  this  were  done  it  would 
be  quite  unnecessary  to  drive  private  capital  and  individual 
initiative  out  of  the  business  of  employers  liability  insurance. 
It  seemed  to  me  perfectly  plain  that  the  failure  cf  those  who  are 
now  in  the  business  to  give  satisfaction  to  the  public  had  been 
inevitable  from  the  start,  on  account  of  the  conditions  under 
which  the  business  has  had  to  be  carried  on.  Under  these  cir¬ 
cumstances,  it  seemed  to  me  that  we  ought  to  change  the  conditions 
under  which  the  business  was  transacted,  rather  than  punish  the 
men  in  the  business  for  offenses  they  were  not  personally  re¬ 
sponsible  for. 

At  the  risk  of  taking  up  more  of  your  time  than  I  ought,  I 
should  like  to  explain  precisely  what  I  mean  when  I  assert  that 
the  existing  liability  laws  of  New  York  are  directly  responsible 
for  the  principal  evils  which  have  gradually  developed  in  the 
business  of  casualty  insurance.  Under  these  laws,  a  working 
man  who  is  injured  in  the  course  of  his  employment  may  demand 
what  he  pleases  from  his  employer  as  compensation  for  injuries. 
The  law  is  silent  on  the  subject  of  what  he  is  entitled  to  receive. 
For  a  comparatively  trivial  injury,  he  can  claim  $50,000,  if  he 
chooses.  If  that  does  not  suit  him,  he  can  claim  $100,000.  The 
employer  against  whom  such  a  claim  is  made  has,  we  will  as¬ 
sume,  insured  himself  against  such  claims  in  a  stock-liability 
company,  and  when  some  ambulance-chasing  attorney  induces  an 
injured  working  man  to  claim  excessive  and  ruinous  damages, 
what  usually  happens  is  that  the  employer  turns  the  claim  over 
to  the  insurance  company  whose  policy  he  holds,  and  he  expects 
the  company  to  shoulder  all  future  responsibility  in  connection 
with  the  entire  matter.  What  under  such  circumstances  is  the 
duty  of  the  insurance  company  ?  Shall  it  pay  all  claims  at  their 
face  value  ?  To  do  so  when  the  law  says  nothing  as  to  how  much 
the  injured  man  shall  receive  would  spell  bankruptcy  in  a  day 
for  the  insurance  companies  and  wealth  beyond  the  dreams  of 
avarice  for  ambulance  chasers.  Obviously  no  such  course  as  that 
is  to  be  expected  from  companies  having  the  slightest  desire  to 


. 


10 


remain  solvent  over  night.  The  only  other  course  open  to  them 
is  to  try  to  settle  these  claims  upon  the  best  possible  terms.  That 
of  course  is  what  they  do,  and  out  of  this  inevitable  procedure, 
and  the  litigation  which  is  apt  to  follow,  has  developed  nearly 
all  the  existing  dislike  for  the  casualty  companies.  These  condi¬ 
tions,  I  say,  are  inevitable  in  the  very  nature  of  the  case  under  our 
present  laws.  It  ought  to  he  plain  to  any  fair-minded  man  that 
their  existence  is  not  due  to  any  natural  viciousness  on  the  part 
of  casualty  insurance  men,  or  to  anything  essentially  disreputable 
about  the  liability  business  itself.  Intrinsically  speaking,  it  is 
a  perfectly  decent,  respectable  business,  and  the  men  in  control 
of  it  to-day  are  perfectly  decent,  respectable  men.  That  being 
the  situation,  the  obvious  thing  to  do,  it  seems  to  me,  is  to  remedy 
the  conditions  under  which  the  business  is  now  being  transacted, 
rather  than  to  destroy  the  business  itself.  That  is  precisely 
what  would  have  been  accomplished  if  our  compensation  bill  of 
last  winter  had  become  a  law.  Injured  working  men  and  their 
dependents  would  then  have  known  precisely  what  they  were  en¬ 
titled  to  receive,  in  case  of  injury.  They  would  have  had  no 
right  to  ask  for  more  than  the  law  gave  them ;  and  employers,  on 
their  side,  could  have  asked  them  to  take  no  less.  All  excuse 
for  controversy  would  have  ceased  to  exist,  and  with  the  excuse 
gone,  the  controversies  would  have  soon  died  out.  Under  Wcrk- 
men’s  Compensation  this  would  come  about  more  or  less  auto¬ 
matically.  But  not  relying  entirely  upon  the  operation  of 
natural  laws  to  protect  the  laboring  man  in  his  future  dealings 
with  these  insurance  companies,  our  bill  went  so  far  as  to  provide 
that  settlements  under  the  act  should  become  effective  only  on  re¬ 
ceiving  the  approval  of  an  Industrial  Board,  upon  which  it  was 
presumed  that  there  would  always  be  representatives  of  organ¬ 
ized  labor.  Thus  were  the  courts,  lawyers  and  vexatious  litiga¬ 
tion  entirely  cut  out  of  the  scheme.  That  is  to  say,  the  Indus¬ 
trial  Board  just  mentioned  was  given  exclusive  jurisdiction  over 
all  disputed  questions  of  fact.  Only  questions  of  law  in  connec¬ 
tion  with  an  industrial  accident  could  be  taken  into  the  courts. 
It  seemed  to  me  last  winter,  and  it  still  seems  to  me,  that  it 
would  be  very  much  better  to  write  a  hill  of  this  kind  upon  the 
statute  bocks,  than  to  destroy,  in  a  spirit  of  resentment  over  past 
practices,  the  only  kind  of  liability  insurance  which  we  now  have 
— 'namely,  stock  company  insurance.  It  seemed  to  me  that  it 
would  be  both  unwise  from  the  standpoint  of  the  state  to  do  such 
a  thing,  and  unfair  from  the  standpoint  of  the  companies.  It 


11 


would  have  been  equally  reprehensible,  I  admit,  to  have  granted 
a  monopoly  of  this  business  to  the  stock  companies,  but  what  our 
bill  did  was  the  precise  opposite  of  this.  It  subjected  the  stock 
companies,  for  the  first  time,  to  sharp  competition  from  other 
insurance  organisms.  At  first  we  depended  upon  the  newly 
created  mutuals  for  such  competition;  subsequently  we  created 
the  state  fund  as  an  additional  competitor.  So  you  see  that  we 
tried  to  provide  every  possible  safeguard  against  the  oppression 
of  injured  working  men  and  their  dependents  by  the  insurance 
companies.  Under  our  bill,  the  very  best  that  the  stock  com¬ 
panies  could  hope  for  was  an  opportunity  to  prove  themselves 
qualified  to  give  a  more  satisfactory  service  to  the  public,  under 
a  Workmen’s  Compensation  Law,  than  either  of  the  other  alter¬ 
native  forms  of  insurance  could  give.  Unless  they  could  do  that, 
they  would  inevitably  be  driven  out  of  business  within .  a  few 
years  by  the  inexorable  law  of  competition.  If  on  the  other 
hand  they  could  demonstrate  their  ability  to  do  this,  it  has  always 
been  incomprehensible  to  me  why  anyone  should  want  these  com¬ 
panies  to  go  out  of  existence. 

But  notwithstanding  all  this,  the  fact  is,  gentlemen,  that  the 
Governor  cf  Yew  York  State  was  sufficiently  impressed  with 
last  winter’s  manifestations  of  a  popular  hostility  toward 
casualty  companies  to  veto  a  splendid  compensation  measure 
which  had  been  criticized  by  labor  representatives  because  it 
gave  these  companies  the  chance  to  prove  their  right  to  live,  in 
competition  with  other  insurance  organisms.  Louder  and 
louder  as  the  fight  progressed  grew  the  demand  for  State  Insur¬ 
ance  in  connection  with  the  payment  of  industrial  claims,  until 
finally  the  original  object  of  the  legislation  we  advocated  — 
namely,  the  establishment  of  the  principle  of  Workmen’s  Com¬ 
pensation  in  Yew  York  State  —  was  entirely  lest  sight  of  and 
forgotten  in  the  clamor  which  arose  for  this  new  form  of  social- 
istic  experiment.  Precisely  what  all  this  betokens  for  the  future 
is  something  which  thoughtful  men  connected  with  the  business 
of  insurance  had  better  consider  very  carefully.  In  the  mean¬ 
time,  we  Yew  Yorkers  have,  as  I  said  in  the  beginning,  cur 
compensation  problem  still  to  solve.  I  look  with  some  degree 
of  envy  upon  my  more  fortunate  brethren  from  other  states  who 
have  succeeded  in  getting  this  matter .  “  off  their  plates,”  as  my 
friend  Appleton  would  express  it,  and  into  the  statute  books  of 
their  respective  commonwealths. 


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